Scientists discover only the second planet to hang out near 4 stars

Astronomers have discovered what is only the second known planet living in a family of four stars.

While still rare, the find means four-star systems with planets are much more common than previously believed. Discovery News notes that the discovery could have significant implications about how planets form in multi-star systems.

Scientists had previously identified the planet, but thought it was part of a three-star system. Only recently did astronomers discover a fourth star, a red dwarf, lurking there.

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"Star systems come in myriad forms. There can be single stars, binary stars, triple stars, even quintuple star systems," Lewis Roberts from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory told Discovery News. "It's amazing the way nature puts these things together."

Scientists now believe that four percent of solar-type stars are part of four-star systems. The findings about the new four-star system, named 30 Ari, will be published in the Astronomical Journal.